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Look out yummy mummies: I too have Help
By ella | July 28, 2006
Last week I was wondering how the hell I was going to get through the summer: I had advertised for a mother’s help without any response and the house was looking more and more like a bomb had hit it. The school holidays loomed over me as blackly as the thought of yet another pregnancy. But someone Up There must have taken pity on me because on Friday I had three responses to my advert and then a friend also told me that her cleaner had a space in her weekly schedule. Good cleaners are like gold dust around here and I wanted her more than I want a good night’s sleep.
So this week I employed a mother’s help for two afternoons a week to help with supper and bath time - the arsenic hour - and a cleaner. Admitting that makes me feel uncomfortably upper-middle class but it turns out I am the last to become a bona-fide member of this group in my mummy-circles for when I first asked around a few friends for a recommendation for a cleaner I was surprised to find out that almost everyone here who has small children already had a cleaner. I know it’s not the normal thing that comes up in conversation but it sure felt like all the mothers were keeping the fact that they had a cleaner secret.
The mother’s help will be just for the few weeks of the summer while there is no nursery. The cleaner will be permanent until there are no more babies in the house because I have had enough of constantly cleaning, not having enough time to do the rest of the constant cleaning and yet still living in a level of dirt that I don’t really want to become accustomed to. And because Youngest Son, Ben, seems to be allergic to pretty much everything, keeping the house clean has assumed a level of importance not otherwise seen before in this house. Pet hair and dust mites are no longer our friends. Well they never were but now they have become like an alien invader: get that allergen OUT OF THIS HOUSE.
I asked the cleaner to use environmentally-friendly cleaning products and she looked at me like I had asked her to brush the house with tar. I’m not sure if she thinks they will take more elbow grease or just won’t clean at all but perhaps I can persuade her that toxic, carcinogenic chemicals will not make a place any cleaner (loos excepted but then I have an obsession with keeping loos germ-free). However as my house hasn’t looked clean for the last six months it’s no wonder she doubts their efficacy.
The mother’s help is a sixteen year old school leaver waiting to start college to do a childcare qualification. What’s the betting she changes her career plans after a summer looking after my children? And probably to something very safe, like accounting or lion taming. Anything where small children are not involved.
So I will have a clean house and some help looking after the children. Next week I expect to metamorphose into a yummy mummy and everyone will wonder how. Obviously I shan’t be telling them.
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Categories: Daily Life
6 Comments
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I’m sure you realise you’re very lucky. Most people have to look after their own children and clean their ouwn houses.
Thank you A, I love being told I’m ‘lucky’ because, you know, I think maybe I should struggle a bit more and make life harder for myself than I need to. Or perhaps I should have employed a full time nanny and a full time housekeeper because I’m that lazy.
Remind me to put comment moderation back on.
You probably should have said MISTER A there….
Good on you, Ella. I cannot imagine my life without my cleaner - and as I always say, signing up for motherhood doesn’t mean you’re signing up for housewifedom or never having a break ever (however much is sometimes feels like it). Hope your mother’s help is an angel 16 year old who loves every minute of it!!
Thank you gpmum, I much prefer the comments of support.
What I would do without good daycare for my kids, I just don’t know. When you have as many young kids as you do, help is absolutely neccesary, if you expect to spend any time at all playing with the kids or taking care of yourself - or if you want a clean house.
Thank you Teri. I’ve tried the do it all myself route before and I nearly lost my mind. I appreciate your assertion ‘help is absolutely necessary’ - so why do I feel so guilty about it?